Tag Archives: dario argento

I have a slight obsession with monkeys. Not an unhealthy perverse kind of obsession, but an obsession nonetheless. Why do you think my favorite commercial from the Super Bowl was ‘Puppy Monkey Baby’? Now as I sit here and think about the usage of monkeys in horror movies in various aspects, I am reminded of one monkey who never really got much shine (subtle pun there). Am I talking about the Sumatran rat monkey from Dead Alive? Pffft. I wish. No – I’m talking about the great ‘Inga The Monkey’ from Dario Argento’s underrated Italian horror movie Creepers!

I know, it’s mostly know by the original title Phenomena, but in the United States I will always know it as Creepers. This is honestly one of my top Dario Argento films and the ending is easily one of my favorites ever (not to mention the soundtrack kicks major ass). If you haven’t seen this movie, then obviously the clip below contains major spoilers – but if you have seen it then you know that ‘Inga The Monkey’ makes a triumphant appearance in the end with a shiny razor!

Amazing how cleanly that head came flying off, huh? Gotta love Italian horror. Side note that doesn’t have anything to do with this clip btw: Dario Argento loves maggots. Ok, now onto the monkey. Not only do I love that the monkey ends up saving Jennifer Connelly, but I half was waiting for Inga to give a thumbs up or black power fist after defeating Frau Brückner with the hand razor. Kudos to you Inga for your loyalty and for having the know-how to toss that weapon to the side like it’s hot. Hopefully she got rid of the fingerprints. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go befriend a monkey so I can have protection in the future in case a bunch of street toughs corner me in an alley.

Ooooh…..a tricky one. See – Betty has needles piercing into her eyelids, so for her to blink is going to be extremely rare. Unless of course she enjoys terrible pain in her eyelids, which could be the case – you never know. Stay strong and keep focused! Oh fuck it….who are we kidding. You can’t beat someone in a staring contest with needles stuck in their eyelids. You lose!!

Lamberto Bava and Dario Argento’s 1985 Italian horror classic, Demons, is about to turn 30 years old! And that makes me feel equally as old! But enough about my age insecurities, let’s talk about the awesome releases that Rustblade.Com has coming to celebrate the birthday. Over at their website, you can pre-order a few limited edition releases:

The vinyl and CD versions are also sold separately (and come with non-autographed posters), but the are limited to the number given above.

Being the horror vinyl collector that I am, I already snagged two copies and as of the writing of this post, there were only about 65 copies left out of the 666 total amount for the vinyl. Head on over to Rustblade.Comand pick up yours today. Be aware though that this is the Claudio Simonetti composed soundtrack and does not contain the heavy metal tracks (Billy Idol, Motley Crue, etc) from the movie that are available on the original soundtrack release. Still awesome though, so celebrate the Demons 30th Anniversary and break out your best Tony The Pimp impressions while you do!

Want to see a woman get hit square in the back by an iron from a homicidal killer in an Italian horror movie? Here ya go!

Hahaha! That’s funny. Until she dies a horrible death of course, which I’ll talk about in a minute. That clip is from Dario Argento’s underrated 1987 giallo film, Opera (aka Terror At The Opera). Soak it in folks, because this was Argento in his prime. And Opera is full of vintage Argento, especially the scene I eluded to involving the wardrobe seamstress Giulia getting back-smacked with the iron while Betty (interesting Italian horror movie name btw) is forced to watch her die with needles taped under her eyes. Good times!

Speaking of good times, Giulia accidentally swallows the bracelet that the killer is after while she’s dying. Let’s just say that when he shoves the shears down her throat to try and retrieve it (all to a killer metal soundtrack I might add), I was squirming in my seat. The good news for us, the viewer, is that he doesn’t succeed and has to cut through her throat to finally get back what he’s after, with effective sound effects to boot. Hooray! Watch the full scene below. It’s in Spanish btw – so my apologies if you don’t speak Spanish. Ay Dios Mio!

What is it with Italian horror movies killing off blind people? In 1985’s Demons, a poor blind guy bit the dust by having his non-seeing eyes smooshed in. The precursor to that happened in 1977’s Suspiria, when Dario Argento thought he would set the gold standard for blind people cruelty and let a guide dog take a chunk out of his sightless master’s jugular.

So, on this special edition of Monday Bloody Monday, we’re going to all gather around and watch that scene from Suspiria. Two things come to mind when I revisit this moment by the way. First, german shepherds are awesome dogs. And second, what the hell happened to Dario Argento? It’s sad to watch a fantastic movie like this and then watch his attempts at filmmaking nowadays where he has Dracula turning into a giant praying mantis. But I digress. Now let’s watch a blind guy get his throat ripped out by a dog.

Movies with two names kind of annoy me. But so is usually the case when we’re talking about the Italian horror genre. No matter if you want to call Dario Argento’s 1985 psychic/insect movie Creepers or Phenomena, it has one of the best posters EVER!

Now for whatever reason, there is a version of this poster that isn’t exposing Jennifer Connelly’s half-decaying bug face, but clearly the un-edited version is the keeper here. The image above is actually an ad for the promotion of the VHS version of Creepers, but the tagline on the original poster is “It Will Make Your Skin Crawl“. Fitting, considering there are a bunch of bugs flying around that could actually make your skin crawl.

I have to confess that I haven’t seen this movie in years. And after looking at this poster again, I definitely need to revisit it. Not only does it have the late great Donald Pleasence in it, but how the fuck can you go wrong with a movie that has Iron Maiden and Motorhead on the soundtrack? Another thing that this poster is making me realize is that we need more horror movies about bugs. Whether it’s spiders, cockroaches, or maybe a random remake of 1988’s movie about killer slugs appropriately titled Slugs – everyone can relate to bugs! Get on that Hollywood. Until then, it’s off to Amazon to purchase Creepers or Phenomena or whatever the hell you want to call it.

Yep, back to back weeks of Dario Argento movies! Last week on Sunday Bloody Sunday we had the arm chop from Tenebre. And this week it’s all about a bullet through a peephole (that would be a good name for a song btw) from Mr. Argento’s 1987 underrated giallo, Opera.

I’m sure a lot of you out there have had some peephole anxiety in the past. You get a knock on the door, but before you open it – you put your peeper up to the peephole to get a peak at who it is. The whole fisheye lens can be deceiving and frustrating because it can be hard to get a good look at who’s on the other side. Unfortunately for Mira (Daria Nicolodi) in Opera, she may have spent a little too much time on peephole patrol. Without spoiling her ridiculous but entertaining death, I’ll let you watch it below to fully enjoy it:

*WARNING: The clip that you’re about to watch in this post contains an extremely unrealistic chopping off of an arm by an axe. You’ve been warned*

God bless Dario Argento. Why the hell doesn’t he make good movies anymore though? That’s a question that could take a while to find an answer to, so lets focus on some of his better work from days past to take our minds off of that.

On this week’s Sunday Bloody Sunday it’s about to get all giallo red up in here, because I’m highlighting one of the best and most ridiculous death scenes from Argento’s 1982 slasher: Tenebre. If you haven’t seen the movie, then I’m about to spoil the fact that the character of Jane is about to be hacked up by an axe murderer. But before she’s done for good, she’s going to decide to paint the beautiful white walls in her house bright red! I heard that she did always have dreams of becoming an interior designer.

Who farted??? No one? Ahhhh. That smell then is the stench of bad horror movies from 2013. And there were definitely some stinkers, but only a handful deserve mention in Dirty Horror’s Bottom 5 Horror Movies Of 2013. Let’s get this shitfest started! Continue reading →